Florida Real Estate Auctions Give Sellers a Boost
Bonnie Whittemore’s two-bedroom, two-bath Bonita Springs condo sat on the market for 18 months with no takers. So she turned to an unconventional, sure-fire way to drum up interest in her property: an auction.
It worked. Her condo sold in six weeks.
Auctions are on the rise nationwide, according to a study commissioned by the National Auctioneers Association. Residential real estate auctions are the fastest-growing kind, generating $16 billion in sales in 2006, a 39 percent increase from 2003.
“People are starting to understand and see that auctions are an effective way of selling properties,” said Troy Ayers, CEO of Premier Real Estate Auctions on Marco Island. “We literally get hundreds of calls weekly from people wanting to sell their properties.”
The flooded housing market is sparking auctions in the Southwest Florida housing market.
“I think the thing that makes the auction process successful in bad times, it basically recreates what made us so successful in ’05,” Ayers said. “The auction process assembles everyone together in one room and creates that excitement and creates this sense of urgency.”
At an absolute auction, the highest bidder automatically wins; at a reserve auction, the seller sets a minimum price.“(Absolute) draws a better crowd,” Whittemore said, who had about 15 Florida mortgage borrowers attend her event. “I recouped everything. All my improvements. Even after marketing and the Realtor.”
Carla Bonten, a Florida real estate agent, got her auctioneer’s license in February.
She held her first real estate auction on July 14 at an Elks Lodge and on proxibid.com with 23 properties — 18 lots and a duplex in San Carlos Park, two lots in Lehigh Acres, a condo in Bonita Springs and a house in Cape Coral.
No bids came in high enough to satisfy the sellers.
“There was no competition,” Bonten said. About 25 people attended, but only five bid. It was over in 45 minutes. “Auctions are hot. That is for sure. It’s just not the right time right now. It’s slow in the summer.”
